Intrada announced two new CDs featuring never-before released scores this week, including an early score by a fan favorite and an especially surprising release -- a two-disc compilation of music from a largely forgotten '60s TV series.

Right between his first two Robert Zemeckis-directed smash hits, Romancing the Stone and Back to the Future,Alan Silvestri scored Kevin Reynolds' feature directorial debut FANDANGO, inspired by his USC student film Proof, a comedy-drama set in 1971 and starring Kevin Costner (in his first leading role in a studio film), Judd Nelson, Sam Robards and Suzy Amis. The film received only the briefest releases in theaters in 1985 (I'm ashamed to say that even I still haven't seen it) but was critically well regarded, and the director went on to an eclectic career with such projects as the hugely underrated The Beast, the blockbuster Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves, the notorious Waterworld and the recent TV hit Hatfields & McCoys. The Intrada release features for the first time Silvestri's original recording of the score, plus 7 minutes of alternates and source cues.

In case film music fans were worried that the labels would only be releasing scores by popular films (particularly those from the '80s and '90s) composed by fan favorites, Intrada has startlingly bucked the trend with their new, two-disc set of music from the short-lived TV series THEN CAME BRONSON. Sort of a cross between Route 66 and Easy Rider (but premiering only months after Easy Rider's first U.S. screening), Bronson told the story of a disilusioned newspaperman who rides around the country on a Harley-Davidson, impacting the lives of strangers. Bronson was played by Michael Parks, decades before Quentin Tarantino spotlighted the actor's versatility with roles in such films as Kill Bill (both volumes) and Django Unchained, and the show's pilot score, composed by Golden Age great and five-time Oscar nominee George Duning, was released by Film Score Monthly as part of their wondrous TV Omnibus boxed set. Intrada's Bronson features Duning episode cues on Disc One, with Disc Two filled by a variety of composers including TV veterans John Parker, Stu Phillips and Richard Shores as well as unfamiliar names (even to me) such as Dean Elliott, Tom McIntosh and Philip Springer.

La-La Land plans to release two new CDs next week -- an expanded, two-disc version of James Horner's score for the second of the Jack Ryan adventure films, 1992's PATRIOT GAMES, and a second volume of Frederik Wiedmann's music for GREEN LANTERN: THE ANIMATED SERIES.

On August 6, Varese Sarabande will release the soundtrack to the upcoming science-fiction action film ELYSIUM, starring Matt Damon and Jodie Foster, the second film from District 9's Oscar nominee Neil Blomquist (I'm not a District 9 fan -- though I'm thrilled a sci-fi film could get a Best Picture nomination, Moon deserved it way more -- but even I think Elysium looks like it could be really cool). The score was composed by newcomer Ryan Amon.

"Nothing lasts anywhere near that long in the sequel, and there's no counterpart for the lovable child; the monsters mostly interact with robot kids in jokey simulations. Randy Newman's score has no emotional resonance; that's a first. And though many of the characters have multiple heads and eyes, the movie is single-minded to the point of brainlessness in its stress on scares and scaring."

"Director Forster, whose frenetic editing style drew sharp criticism on the James Bond film “Quantum of Solace,” still favors hummingbird pacing over carefully constructed suspense. The score by Marco Beltrami and British rockers Muse effectively hammers home the nonstop action beats."

Colin Covert, Minneapolis Star-Tribune

"But to actually see the chaos, the panic and complete lack of crowd control depicted with the ferocious intensity that director Marc Forster ('Finding Neverland;' no, that’s not a typo) gives these sequences is unnerving; this muddled, flailing survivalist epic is at its best when it goes huge, capturing wave after wave of rabid, chomping bodies from on high as they surge en masse through public spaces like fire ants swarming over carrion. Add in a soundtrack full of ominous droning and some 'Dawn of the Dead' sleazy-keyboard noddling, and by Romero, we’ve got ourselves some seriously overwhelming spectacle."

I've never heard of Springer and McIntosh, but seeing Dean Elliott's name on something that isn't animated (he scored several of the Chuck Jones Tom and Jerry cartoons, the '70s Return To The Planet Of The Apes and assorted Ruby-Spears shows) is a surprise.

I've never heard of Springer and McIntosh, but seeing Dean Elliott's name on something that isn't animated (he scored several of the Chuck Jones Tom and Jerry cartoons, the '70s Return To The Planet Of The Apes and assorted Ruby-Spears shows) is a surprise.

Aha! Thank you - it was bugging me where I had heard Dean Elliot's name before. Liked his Apes music quite a bit!